FROM Brexit to the Battle of Hastings and the Queen’s Coronation to Hitler’s planned invasion – this extraordinary selection of maps tell the history of Britain.

Milestone events in the country’s past are brought to life in a series of images, including how how each area of the country voted in the 2016 EU referendum and population density in different parts of Great Britain during the Victorian era.

Nazi Germany’s plans for Operation Sealion and an image mapping out the 1953 Coronation procession through London have also been gathered for the fascinating collection.

Maps even go back to Roman emperor Julius Caesar’s ill-conceived invasion of Britain in 55 BC, London, in 1558 and the Spanish Armada in 1588.

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A reproduction of an English Civil War-era map

Maps are a very ancient way of making sense of our world

Philip Parker

They feature in new book ‘A History of Britain in Maps' by author and historian Philip Parker who has previously written books on the Roman Empire, the Vikings and the Himalayas.

Mr Parker said he had a particular interest in maps due to their ability to tell a story.

He said: “Maps are a very ancient way of making sense of our world."

“From scratches on rocks made in Neolithic times and ancient Mesopotamian cuneiform tablets to the globe-spanning digital databases of the twenty-first century, they have translated a visual account of a landscape or of a nation into an image that it would take many thousands of words to equal.

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A map highlighting Britain's natural resources

“History of Britain in Maps recounts the story of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland by reflecting on what those maps can tell us about the motives of the mapmakers and the history of the eras in which they lived.

“The maps in this volume span nearly two thousand years, from the Rudge Cup, a bronze Roman vessel which bears a representation of the line of Hadrian’s Wall, to a map showing the distribution of voting in the 2016 referendum on whether Britain should leave the European Union.

“In the time in between, cartographers have mapped routes, property disputes, defensive systems, battles, mineral resources, railways and canal networks, the weather and even the progress of a cholera epidemic; anything in short where the placement of a line, a symbol or an area of shading could display information effectively, tell a story or promote a message."

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A Victorian-era map showing populations

Mr Parker continued: “Every map tells a story. From the smallest – dealing with a property dispute in medieval Yorkshire – to the largest – portraying the whole of the United Kingdom and the density of population after the 1841 census – they are amongst the most eloquent forms of historical narrative.

“The many maps in this book, with their varied perspectives, motives, forms of execution and differing geographical frames, each tell their own tale.

"Together they shed refreshing new light on the wonderful kaleidoscope of patterns that is the history of Britain.”